Posted on 01/20/2015 10:09:38 AM PST by smokingfrog
Despite predictions to the contrary, it seem there is still plenty of life left in the PC market.
PC shipments across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) reached 25.5 million units in the fourth quarter of 2014, a two percent increase on the same quarter a year ago, according to calculations by IDC.
It said strong consumer demand during the holiday season meant the PC market racked up a third consecutive quarter of growth - albeit modest and patchy. PC sales across the region grew by 5.5 percent across the year, with 93.3 million PCs shipped.
But the researchers noted there are big differences across the region: Western Europe continued to drive growth, with shipments increasing 10.7 percent. The Middle East and Africa grew 2.6 percent, while Central and Eastern Europe contracted 18.7 percent.
As a result, IDC said the market was primarily driven by healthy consumer shipments in Western Europe, and vendors stocking up for Christmas and January sales, resulting in portable PC shipments increasing 5.3 percent; in contrast desktop PC shipments contracted 3.5 percent during the quarter.
In Western Europe, shipments for the holiday season and post-Christmas promotions underpinned the growth particularly in the consumer space, with France and the U.K. showing "solid double-digit percentage growth". IDC said promotions have been key to driving demand and boosting consumer portable PC shipments by 18.2 percent and consumer desktops by 13.2 percent. But the positive impact of the end of Windows XP support on desktops ended, which explained the 3.9 percent decline in business sales, even though business demand for laptops and notebooks was up with a 12.6 percent increase.
Overall desktop shipment growth in Western Europe reached 1.6 percent and portable PCs 15.9 percent.
(Excerpt) Read more at zdnet.com ...
I’m satisfied with my lightweight laptop and don’t anticipate ever buying a desktop again. My wife may get a tablet to go with her laptop, but I don’t like tablets myself.
My wife and I have both been using laptops for over a year now. Both have Win 7, lots of RAM, and SSDs. They do pretty much everything we need, and can take them with us everywhere. I do have a big iMac for a ‘Desktop’(that thing is awesome), and we have iPads for when we need to travel and can’t lug a big laptop around.
I have a desk top with XP and a laptop with Windows 7 and for general use I prefer the desk top.
There was a posting a few days ago about Linux based operating systems, wish I knew if I could use them on this thing, man, do I hate windows 8!
I still prefer my desktop, mainly because of the keyboard. I learned typing way back in high school, in the early 60’s, using the old Underwood manual type writer, with covered keys. Later, I spent years tying on an IBM selectric.
The new laptops have those rubbery keys, or the membrane keyboard. No resistance no click, no feedback feel.
And, I’m not crazy about the mouse pad. Being a touch-typist, I keep hitting it with my thumbs, causing crazy stiff. I can turn it off, the KB still feels unnatural to me.
And lastly, I like to be at my desk when I work.
I’m still crying over the loss of XP .. I loved that software because of it’s structure.
The reason was .. I knew exactly where my documents were going to end up when I saved them; I NEVER, EVER had to spend half an hour searching for something.
Now, with MS7, I can’t find anything. I look in the place where it should be .. and it’s not there; even though I specifically set up a directory. I HATE THIS SOFTWARE.
I know I’m not alone .. and I’m hoping MS10 will solve this problem. I’ve surely sent them enough msgs about this issue.
Now, if I’m working on a chapter of a book, I have to keep the current chapter on my desktop - just so I don’t have to spend so much time searching for it when I want to edit it.
RIDICULOUS.
Windows tiles works great on a phone or a touch screen laptop, and also when used for entertainment. I use all these modes.
But it’s an unnecessary layer when doing work. It would be nice if you could toggle it on and off.
“But laptop sales jump,” because it’s easy to install a UNIX-like system on a cheap computer.
I have a Win7 desktop and laptop.
I use the desktop for ‘real’ computing.
I use the laptop for perusing the net while watching TV.
Ironically, the laptop has an i-7 processor and the desktop has an i-5 processor. The desktop has more production power than the laptop.
I have started getting ‘your browser is out of date’ messages on some websites. I dread the next level of replacement (Win 10 or later). I had to jerry-rig some of the old XP programs to run on Win7. I lost several others — most of which do not have comparable replacements.
The problem with trying to update is that is creates new problems while, maybe, fixing old problems. I have had conflicts with Win7 updates, Firefox, Palemoon, Java, Adobe Flash, and several others. Fix one problem, and it breaks something else. I stopped most of my updating early last year — because my programs were working together then.
See post right above.
Can’t hurt to try;
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2014/05/27/simple-hack-gives-windows-xp-users-5-more-years-of-support/
I’m still using a home built desktop and will likely continue to do so because it can be easily updated. I did a complete rebuild when I switched to Windows 7 using nothing more than a screwdriver. Updating a laptop or tablet requires buying a whole new system.
“There was a posting a few days ago about Linux based operating systems, wish I knew if I could use them on this thing, man, do I hate windows 8!”
I can offer two suggestions:
1. Download the “Classic Shell” app from www.classicshell.net. It makes Windows 8.1 tolerable.
2) You can test any computer for Linux compatibility without installing Linux by trying out a demo boot disk. Go to a Linux website, such as Linux Mint or Ubuntu, and download an .ISO image file. Burn a bootable DVD from that file. When you boot up a new computer, you will probably have to disable hardware security (which only allows Windows to run) in the CMOS setup. Then the Linux disk should boot up. If you decide you like Linux, you can optionally install it from the demo.
I will never be happy with anything other than a real ergonomic keyboard and mouse with two buttons on top, and two on the side.
I hate laptops, but they do have their place.
As MS-DOS version 3.3 was the sweet spot in the balance of power and memory footprint, so was Windows 2000 in the GUI arena. Before the service packs, it only took @ 35 meg hard drive space and ran like a scalded ape. Updated, it was as bloated as XP. I still liked it better, but there ain’t no going back.
Check out classicshell.net.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.